


sing until our jaws are broken

by meretricula



Category: Football RPF
Genre: Coping, Friendship, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-09-17
Updated: 2011-09-17
Packaged: 2017-10-23 20:04:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,156
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/254358
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/meretricula/pseuds/meretricula
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The person you go to when you don't know where else to go.</p>
            </blockquote>





	sing until our jaws are broken

Manel was the one who told Xavi, and once he understood what Manel was saying, underneath the fear and anger at the unfairness of what had happened, a tiny part of him was despicably grateful that at least it hadn't been Puyi who called him. If he had, if he had decided it was the captain's duty to tell the squad, Xavi would have had to offer to help, and just hearing the words was bad enough; he didn't think he could stand to pick up the phone and repeat them to someone else.

After he hung up he spent some incalculable amount of time sitting on the couch, staring at the television without turning it on. The room got gradually darker around him, and when he finally got up, thinking blankly that he had better do something about dinner, he tripped over the edge of the same carpet he'd had in his living room for years. He got to the kitchen and stood in front of the open refrigerator for a good five minutes before closing it again and going back to the living room. He wasn't hungry. Nothing in the kitchen even looked like food. When the phone rang he was almost glad just to have something break the silence.

"Hello?"

"It's me," Victor said abruptly, after a pause that went on a little too long; Xavi had almost taken the phone away from his ear to check it was connected properly. "Did you--has anyone--"

"Estiarte called me," Xavi said.

"Oh." Xavi waited again, listening to the sound of Victor breathing. Finally he blurted, "Can I see you?"

"Yes, of course," Xavi said, surprised, and got to his feet to look for his shoes. He wasn't really dressed to go out of the house, but that wasn't important. "Where are you?"

There was another pause; Xavi started to wonder if maybe there was something wrong with Victor's phone. "I'm in my car in your driveway."

"Oh." Xavi blinked and stopped halfway through putting on the flip-flops he'd found in his entryway. When he opened the door and looked outside, he recognized Victor's car right away; it was, as always, hard to miss. Victor himself was less obtrusive, a motionless presence behind the wheel. "Do you, um. Do you want to come in?"

That got Victor moving, at least. Xavi put down the phone and kicked off his remaining shoe, and then he just stood in the doorway watching as Victor got out of the car and walked up the drive. It seemed to take longer than it should have for him to get to the door.

"Victor," Xavi started to say, but he never got any further. Victor lunged out, lightning-quick and clumsier than he'd been since he grew out of his nerves and into his longer limbs; he didn't so much hug Xavi as envelop him. "Hey," Xavi said quietly. He put his hands on Victor's back and felt it move with each breath, faster than just climbing up the driveway would have made it. "Hey."

"I'm sorry," Victor said eventually, as his grip loosened from painful to only firm. "I shouldn't have--I'm sorry."

"Come inside," Xavi said. One heartbeat, two, and finally Victor let go. Xavi turned and walked into the house, Victor so close on his heels he almost tripped.

"Sit down," Xavi ordered in the living room. He kept walking toward the kitchen. "Do you want anything to drink? Water, juice? I've got beer in the fridge, I think." Five minutes of staring into his refrigerator and he still had to guess at what was inside it.

"No, thank you," Victor said, soft-voiced and stilted in a way he never was, not anymore, and then, in an awful reflex that Xavi recognized and wished he didn't, he added, "I'm fine." Xavi didn't look back at him; he got a bottle of water for each of them anyway.

It took him a moment to locate Victor when he returned. He'd done as Xavi told him and sat down, but he was on the floor instead of the couch. Xavi hesitated for a moment before sitting above him, not beside him, and he knew he'd made the right decision when Victor leaned his head against his knee, looking almost painfully grateful. Xavi put his hand on Victor's scalp and waited.

"I don't know what to do," Victor said suddenly. His voice was harsh, and it cracked on the last word. "I don't--what--I don't know what I'm supposed to _do_."

"The doctors are going to take care of him," Xavi said. "You don't have to--"

"No," Victor interrupted. "No, you don't--he's one of my defenders, he's _mine_ , all right? He's mine. I have to--I don't know what. But I have to."

"All right," Xavi said, because he really didn't know, but he could understand, a little. If it had been Busi, or Keita, or Andres-- "I'm surprised you're not over at Andres' place right now," he added, half-teasing and half-serious, mostly because he had to say something or else he would keep thinking it, that it could have been one of _his_ , it could have been Andres, and he hated himself for even thinking it once. The way Victor immediately jerked away from his hand made it clear it had been the wrong thing to say.

"You thought I would--how could you think that?" Victor demanded. The angle between them made it very difficult for him to look Xavi in the eye but he had craned his head back as far as it would go and was giving it his best shot. "You _saw_ what he was like, after Dani--after Dani--"

It took Xavi a moment to understand what he meant, that he was talking about Espanyol's Dani, Andres' Dani. Andres and Victor's Dani. "You can't protect him from people dying," he said. He hadn't let himself use that word yet, not even in his own head. He could have slapped himself for saying it to Victor.

"I can protect him from me being a fuck-up about it," Victor said grimly. "He doesn't need to deal with me right now. I'd just make it worse."

Xavi wanted to say that Andres was stronger than that, that he wouldn't thank Victor for that kind of protection, but even now, there were some things Victor knew about Andres better than he did--better than anyone did. Xavi did remember what Andres had been like, after Dani Jarque died. So maybe Victor was right. "Okay," he said. He carefully put his hand on Victor's head again, and Victor settled back down, his cheek pressed to Xavi's knee. The stubble on his scalp felt like peach fuzz, Xavi thought incongruously.

"I'm scared," Victor said quietly, a while later.

"I know," Xavi said. He kept stroking Victor's hair, although he wasn't sure who he was comforting anymore. "I am too."

**Author's Note:**

> 1\. Midway through the 2010-11 season, Barcelona defender Eric Abidal was diagnosed with a liver tumor. He had surgery to remove the tumor immediately and thankfully he recovered fully, but it was a terrifying episode for him and his teammates.
> 
> 2\. Espanyol player Dani Jarque, a former teammate of Andres Iniesta and Victor Valdes in the Spanish junior national team, died suddenly of heart failure during preseason in 2009. Iniesta was deeply affected by his death; he spent much of the following season struggling with depression.
> 
> 3\. Victor Valdes suffered from depression when he was a teenager.
> 
> 4\. Andres and Victor are [best friends](http://meretricula.livejournal.com/190723.html).
> 
> 5\. Victor did [call Xavi](http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2011/may/25/eric-abidal-comeback-barcelona) after finding out about Abi's diagnosis.
> 
> 6\. Title and cut-text from [Danger and Dread](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JqICFIsk0Fg) by Brown Bird.


End file.
